Guru Investment Theses on Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc

We initiated a position in Valeant Pharmaceuticals International, Inc., (VRX) a specialty pharmaceutical company that is a leader in eye care and dermatology. Unlike most in the pharmaceutical space, Valeant has a very lean cost structure and a much more targeted focus for internal research and development. Instead, the company has been very successful in acquiring proven products. Management is among the best in the business, making every decision through the lens of shareholder value creation.

Sequoia Fund's Discussion of Valeant Pharmaceuticals - Mar 07, 2014

Our largest holding, Valeant, had an outstanding year. Full year numbers have not been reported yet, but we believe that cash earnings per share should exceed $6, well ahead of last year’s result. The big news of the year was the acquisition of Bausch & Lomb for nearly $9 billion in August. The deal should be highly accretive and, together with modest organic growth in its other operations, enable cash earnings per share to increase significantly in 2014. The integration of Bausch & Lomb appears on track with cost synergies, originally estimated by management at around $800 million, now expected to be over $850 million.

Cash earnings per share have probably more than tripled over the last four years. While we do not expect this growth trajectory to continue at such a rapid pace in the future, we do believe the company can continue to produce positive organic growth supplemented by ongoing acquisitions that will enable Valeant to grow cash earnings per share at an above-average rate.

We like Valeant’s approach to the pharmaceutical business. It has acquired a diverse stable of branded, generic and OTC drugs and, more recently, medical devices including dermal fillers and contact lenses. Many of its products are steady sellers in specialty categories like dermatology and ophthalmology. In our view, Valeant is essentially a value investor in health care products.

Wallace Weitz Comments on Valeant Pharmaceuticals - Jul 15, 2013

Valeant (VRX--$86)(VRX) Valeant Pharmaceuticals continues to make acquisitions (most recently agreeing to purchase Bausch and Lomb), wring cost savings from the combined operations, and grow earnings per share. The outlook for Valeant’s well-diversified portfolio of 1,100 products is relatively predictable. The company has a robust pipeline of acquisition candidates and we expect Valeant to build on its dermatology and eye care franchises over the next few years.

Top Ranked Articles about Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc

Jeff Ubben (Trades, Portfolio), founder, chief executive officer and chief investment officer of ValueAct Holding LP, made multiple buys and sells of stocks in just four companies in the fourth quarter. That isn’t typical. Normally, he buys and sells stocks in many companies in a quarter but usually once, rarely on multiple occasions. Read more...

If you don’t know Lou Simpson (Trades, Portfolio), you should. He was the former investment manager at GEICO and Warren Buffett (Trades, Portfolio) spoke highly about him many times. Mr. Simpson just reported his third quarter portfolio. He buys Liberty Global PLC, Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc, U.S. Bancorp, Charles Schwab Corp, Brookfield Asset Management Inc, Oracle Corporation, Wells Fargo & Co, Berkshire Hathaway Inc, Crown Holdings Inc, sells TE Connectivity Ltd during the 3-months ended 09/30/2014, according to the most recent filings of his investment company, SQ Advisors, LLC. As of 09/30/2014, SQ Advisors, LLC owns 13 stocks with a total value of $2.6 billion. These are the details of the buys and sells. Read more...

Using the GuruFocus Aggregated Portfolio Screener you can filter results to see what companies maintain the highest amount of guru ownership. By using this screener, we filtered down to see which companies based in Canada were held by the highest number of gurus. The following five companies come from a variety of industries, are Canadian-based and are held by the largest number of gurus. Read more...

We initiated a position in Valeant Pharmaceuticals International, Inc., (VRX) a specialty pharmaceutical company that is a leader in eye care and dermatology. Unlike most in the pharmaceutical space, Valeant has a very lean cost structure and a much more targeted focus for internal research and development. Instead, the company has been very successful in acquiring proven products. Management is among the best in the business, making every decision through the lens of shareholder value creation. Read more...

Over the past week GuruFocus Real Time Picks reported that Bill Ackman (Trades, Portfolio) made a buy into Allergen (AGN). This is the first buy into the company for Ackman, and he did so in a big way by purchasing a total of 28,878,538 shares of the company’s stock. He bought these shares at the average price of $120.89 per share on April 11, and since this buy the price per share is up 35% to $163.65. Read more...

Using the GuruFocus Aggregated Portfolio Screener you can filter results to see what companies maintain the highest amount of guru ownership. By using this screener, we filtered down to see which companies based in Canada were held by the highest number of gurus. The following five companies come from a variety of industries, are Canadian-based and are held by the largest number of gurus. Read more...

Sequoia benefited greatly from two transformative acquisitions announced in 2013: Valeant’s purchase of Bausch & Lomb and Advance Auto Parts’ purchase of General Parts International. Both deals were game changers which will significantly increase these two companies’ earnings beginning in 2014. While we’ve long been partial to companies that can grow organically, Sequoia’s returns have been boosted considerably by companies that may have limited organic growth opportunities but have done smart serial acquisitions, such as Valeant Pharmaceuticals and Berkshire Hathaway. Precision Castparts has been another serial acquirer that has created great value for shareholders. Read more...

Our largest holding, Valeant, had an outstanding year. Full year numbers have not been reported yet, but we believe that cash earnings per share should exceed $6, well ahead of last year’s result. The big news of the year was the acquisition of Bausch & Lomb for nearly $9 billion in August. The deal should be highly accretive and, together with modest organic growth in its other operations, enable cash earnings per share to increase significantly in 2014. The integration of Bausch & Lomb appears on track with cost synergies, originally estimated by management at around $800 million, now expected to be over $850 million. Read more...

Business Description

Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc was formed on 29th March, 1994 and was formerly known as Biovail Corporation. It is a multinational, specialty pharmaceutical and medical device company that develops, manufactures, and markets a range of branded, generic and branded generic pharmaceuticals, over-the-counter products "OTC", and medical devices such as contact lenses, intraocular lenses, ophthalmic surgical equipment, and aesthetics devices, which are marketed directly or indirectly in over 100 countries. The Company operates in two segments; Developed Markets and Emerging Markets. In the Developed Markets segment, it focuses its efforts in the eye health, dermatology, and neurology therapeutic classes. The Developed Markets segment consists of four reporting units based on geography, namely; U.S., Canada and Australia, Western Europe, and Japan. In the Emerging Markets segment, it focuses on branded generics, OTC products, and medical devices. The Emerging Markets segment consists of three reporting units based on geography, namely; Central & Eastern Europe, Middle East and North Africa, Latin America, and Asia & South Africa. Its principal pharmaceutical products are; Wellbutrin XL, Xenazine, Zovirax Cream, Zovirax, Lotemax, Arestin and Prolensa. Its principal OTC products are; PreserVision, ReNu Multiplus, Ocuvite, Artelac, and CeraVe. The Company relies on a combination of contractual provisions, confidentiality policies and procedures and patent, trademark, copyright and trade secrecy laws to protect the proprietary aspects of its technology and business. Its top four geographic markets are; the U.S. and Puerto Rico, Canada, Poland and Russia. The Company competes with specialty and other pharmaceutical companies, medical device companies, biotechnology companies, OTC companies and generic manufacturers, in the U.S., Canada, the EU and in other countries in which it market its products. The principal raw materials, including active pharmaceutical ingredient, used by the Company "or its third party manufacturers" for its various products are purchased in the open market or are otherwise available from several sources. The Company is subject to extensive U.S. federal and state health care marketing and fraud and abuse regulations, such as the federal False Claims Act, federal and provincial marketing regulation in Canada and similar regulations in foreign countries in which it may conduct its business.

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